Elizabeth, Thomas and I were watching the CNN series on the movies last night, and the installment we saw focused on the Eighties.

And, of course, Working Girl had to be one of the movies the documentary noted. They could’ve spent a lot more time on it, in my opinion.

If the big New Jersey Hair of Melanie Griffith and Joan Cusack is clearly dated, the film and its issues aren’t. This is a film about the obstacles women face, directed and written, I am proud to say, with great sympathy, by men.

I think it’s Mike Nichols’ finest film.

And I might still say that had Nichols ended Working Girl after the first three minutes.

The cinematography is stunning; the opening sequence, shot from a helicopter, is a loving study of the Statue of Liberty that then pulls back to reveal Southern Manhattan–including, tragically, the Twin Towers–the Jersey shore and the the camera swoops in again, gliding alongside the Staten Island Ferry until the dissolve that takes us to the ferry bench where, in an intimate closeup, Melanie Griffith and Joan Cusack share a birthday cupcake.

It is glorious, as is Carly Simon’s song “Let the River Run.”

This introduced me to a city that terrified me until I saw the Cooper Union, where Lincoln delivered the 1860 speech that made him president, saw the lobby and the city below the observation deck of the Empire State Building and saw, miraculously, the Chrysler building.

It took me two tries to “get” Paris. I fell in love with New York almost immediately. This stunning piece of film-making made that possible.

And I just found this version of Carly Simon’s song, from one of those European song competition shows, La Voz. The singer is Cuban-Spanish, her name is Lieta Molinet, and she nails it. If you are a female-type person, you might just notice that one of the male judges is both entranced and gorgeous. Be that as it may, I think this is a stunning performance of a stunning song.